Meg Fowler and Brad Zaffiri recently obtained a defense verdict on behalf of their insurance broker client in St. Louis County following a three-day jury trial.

The plaintiff, a manufacturer of food container lids for the dairy industry, was the victim of a spear phishing attack, which resulted in plaintiff transferring over $100,000 to a hacker. The hacker had gained access to the CEO’s e-mail account and sent e-mails to two employees that appeared to be from the CEO requesting wire transfers ostensibly for business purposes. When the fraud was discovered, the plaintiff was able to stop one transfer, but was unable to recover approximately $70,400 in funds. The plaintiff turned in a claim to their insurance carrier seeking coverage under a theft provision in their commercial property insurance policy. After the insurance carrier denied coverage, the plaintiff sued not only the carrier but also the broker who obtained the policy, alleging that the broker failed to procure coverage to protect it from this type of loss. At trial, the evidence showed that the plaintiff never requested a policy that would cover this type of loss and that the broker had, in fact, obtained all of the coverages the plaintiff required. The jury returned with a unanimous defense verdict after just thirty minutes of deliberation.

Both Fowler and Zaffiri work in the firm’s St. Louis office and focus their practices on complex tort litigation, including insurance law.